To help Santa with his travel plans, the
center has created a report that is available on line. The report
contains maps and tables showing the percent probabilities for
a snow depth of at least 1 inch on Christmas morning, as well
as the probabilities for a depth of at least 5 inches and 10
inches. These probabilities are based on long-term climatology
and not on current weather patterns.

The actual conditions may vary widely from
these probabilities. The snow on the ground or snowfall on Christmas
day will be based on the actual weather pattern during that time.
These probabilities are useful as a guide only to show where
snow on the ground is more likely. If you would like to keep
track of the snowfall across North America on a daily basis,
see the NOAA Operational
Daily Snow Analysis Charts.

The Asheville center has more than 150
years of weather data on hand. These data range from handwritten
observations taken by volunteers in the 19th century to more
sophisticated radar, radiosonde, rocketsonde, and satellite observations
by state-of-the-art equipment. The data include satellite weather
images back to 1960, with 55 gigabytes of new information added
each day--that is equivalent to 18 million pages a day.